Winter Landscapes

January 17, 2018

Winter. Most people hate it. It’s cold, wet, slippery, dark, dead. They prefer spring and summer which are hopeful, bright, and warm. I love winter. Yes, it’s dark, wet, slippery, and cold. But it also has the crystal clear beauty of ice and snow. The air is so fresh and clean and brand new, as it has never been breathed in and out by any living being before. Even if there’s no snow, the bleak and lonely silence of winter is also the sound of a new beginning. Somehow, with all distractions of colour removed, in winter it is easier to see and feel the essentials of life.

“When winter first begins to bite
And stones crack in the frosty night,
When pools are black and trees are bare,
’tis evil in the Wild to fare.”
–– J.R.R. Tolkien

Winter is Coming

“Even the strongest blizzards start with a single snowflake.”

― Sara Raasch, Snow Like Ashes

Snow

“A cold wind was blowing from the north, and it made the trees rustle like living things.”
― George R.R. Martin

Bare Trees

When dark December glooms the day,

And takes our autumn joys away…

–– Walter Scott

Mist over the Forest

“Approaching winter

the old oak no longer

hides its scars”

–– Polona Oblak

Fallen Tree

“And finally Winter, with its bitin’, whinin’ wind, and all the land will be mantled with snow.”

— Roy Bean

Copse in Winter

“I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape — the loneliness of it; the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn’t show.”
–– Andrew Wyeth

Rocks in the Forest

Winter, the aged chief,

Mighty in power,

Exiles the tender leaf,

Exiles the flower.

~Robert Fuller Murray

Frozen Berries

On the Ice #2

Snow falling soundlessly in the middle of the night will always fill my heart with sweet clarity.